The Dream

Chapter 5

Sweat trickled down my body, causing the leather of my outfit to cling to me like a second skin, and it got even more challenging to make those tight turns as we tried to find our way out.

Between the squeaking of the fragile metal beneath with my every step, the quarrelling of the jerk from before with his partner and this leather skinning me alive, I could've lost my mind.

This strange maze and its turns led the unfortunate girl, whose name I learned was Anika, to the top of our group. She was leading us down the straight path when she halted to a stop.

I looked down and sucked in a deep breath, trying to steady my shaking body. The dim yellow light that illuminated this labyrinth shone just enough to see ahead yet just as little so that the darkness below gaped at me.

That gaping darkness looked unearthly...

One wrong move and...

I cleared the thought from my head: readying myself for the cluster of turns that laid before us. Matt stared at the first turn we had to take. "That's a tight one." He said. "All of them are." Troy added, his voice laced with fear as his eyes roamed over the forking of the floor.

"I know." I breathed, dread consuming me as well. "But this is where it's leading us." I justified why we should keep going. "But it looks too hard." Troy objected.

At my words, our eyes simultaneously travelled to the sign that, after countless shifts and turns, was now ahead of us.

It had appeared so opaque that I thought I imagined it when I first glimpsed it, and if I hadn't been chanting the challenge's name over and over as I looked around, I'm confident I would have easily missed it.

Find your way home...

A house-shaped sign...

"The chances are as follows." I started still staring at the sign. "One, it's either we're moving towards the exit out of here, and the turns keep getting more challenging as we approach the right direction." I paused, dreading the second theory. "Or..." I trailed.

I glanced at Matt, whose face mirrored the same grim expression that I felt forming on mine, and I knew he thought of it too.

"Or this whole thing is designed to accelerate towards impossibility whether or not we're moving in the right direction." He continued, saving me the trouble of speaking that harsh possibility.

I doubted Troy was listening as he stared intently at our feet. "Guys..." He breathed, his eyes widening as he stared below, his features gathering into a look of pure horror. "I think something's wrong." He nearly cried.

Before he could explain, I had already felt it, and gathering by: the stiffness of Matt's body and his wide eyes, I knew I wasn't just Imagining it. We stood in place for a minute, unsure of what was happening.

"Woah!" Matt yelped as we felt another shake beneath our feet this time, triggering our balance on the ledge.

As we came to stand still again, Troy turned his head to look at me with tears in his eyes. "What's happening?" He asked in a shaky voice. "I don't know." I whispered, fearing if I spoke any louder, I'd disturb it again.

"Guy's look!" Matt exclaimed, pointing behind us.

The three of us turned our heads in the direction he pointed, loudly gasping as we glimpsed the sight that froze Matt in his place.

"We gotta run." Anika said, yet her eyes and body stood frozen in place. I managed to tear my gaze off the demise that rushed towards us to grab both the boys' hands and tugged on them as I screamed in terror. "Run!" 

At my scream, Matt grasped Anika's hand, and the four of us rushed, sprinting down the ledge, almost slipping at the sharp turns we took.

The metal behind us crumbled and fell, with no trace of a sound or an echo: falling into nothingness, as my insides hollowed deeper than the darkness below at the thought of one slip to a never-ending fall.

My mind couldn't comprehend what laid below or how deep it sank, as my ears kept clinging to the hope of hearing the clink of metal hitting the floor. Yet silence rang louder than any other sound that even the hammering beats of my heart couldn't echo loud enough to silence it.

Our grips tightened on each other's hands as we neared another cluster of turns. They slowed us down, and as crazy as it sounds, it felt like the ledge started collapsing even faster the further we ran away.

Our eyes weren't glued on the sign above as we lost hope in it leading us anywhere. I wanted to stop and take even the briefest look around, though I'd probably only end up holding them back for nothing if I did so.

But there must be a way out of this...

"Guys..." I carefully tailed as the thought crossed my head.

Nobody answered: failing to hear me as they ran frantically, dragging me along with them, but the ledge kept crumbling behind, and the distance drowned in black, with no sign of an escape.

My body acted before I could think, and I found myself yanking on their hands, halting us all to a stop.

It all happened so quickly, and before we could notice, Troy was hanging off the ledge; his only salvation being his death grip on Matt's hand.

"Let go." I whispered, not daring to say the words any louder.

"What?!" Simultaneous exclaims echoed from my friends.

Friends...

I laughed silently at the thought.

Those people are strangers.

But that doesn't mean I can push them to their probable demise...

I sucked in a breath, feeling my lungs burn with air.

"Quit the nonsense, and let's go." The way he sternly stared at me gave the impression that that shaky sentence was supposed to sound serious, maybe even threatening.

I turned my head to see the ledge breaking dangerously close.

My thoughts were silenced.

We're dead anyway...

I yanked my hands forward, feeling the weight of the others tug me down into the unyielding darkness. Our screams echoed back and forth, the sound never seeming to seize or fade.

I couldn't tell how long we'd been falling; all I knew was that my eyelids ached from shutting them so tightly, and all I could feel was the pressure against my chest, locking my breath right in my lungs.

Death awaited...

The scenery of blood and splattered guts was painted vividly before my eyes. We are falling to our demise.

"NO!" Troy's cry sounded around me as we

What was I thinking...

Guilt suffocated me as a choked sob escaped my lips, echoing down the hallow as panic rose up my chest at the thought of killing those poor souls merely because I acted on bloody impulse.

No...

But it wasn't just an impulse. I'm confident this is some type of messed-up joke they're playing on us. This ledge never stopped crumbling, no matter how fast we ran, and a path never cleared out no matter how far we went.

It was never-ending...

I closed my eyes, bracing myself for whatever was to come, and I just let myself fall freely: either to my inevitable end or to the only hope we get out of here alive.